Glenn Sterle (WA, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

Like Senator Marshall, I took offence at some of the statements that were made yesterday. But I want to speak on the Commonwealth Grants Commission’s Report on state revenue sharing relativities: 2007 update. The importance of this report is that it talks about the sharing out of GST revenues to the states. One determinant of the calculation of that distribution is the commission’s assessment of how much the states and territories are spending on education, including vocational education and training. I listened intently to Senator Barnett’s contribution yesterday, as I was in the chamber at the time. I was quite shocked when he made that statement, which Senator Marshall has quoted from Hansard. I have a copy of that in front of me. For those who may have missed Senator Marshall’s contribution, Senator Barnett made the disparaging comment:

Parents considered themselves failures if their children did not leave high school to go on to a university degree.

I am on the record as having proudly stated a number of times in this chamber that I did not go to university. It was not because I did not want to face the challenge of studying and going through tertiary education; it was because I did not want to go to university. There are many thousands of Australian children whom we do not expect to go to university. They do not have to go to university, because they have the desire to chase skills in different areas. The part of Senator Barnett’s comment that really annoyed me was that parents were seen as failures. My parents certainly do not see themselves as failures. They proudly put two of their children through university. In fact, one of their children got two university degrees. The oldest one did not go to university but chased the life of a truck driver. I had better qualify one statement that I made. Actually, I have been to university; I forgot. I seek leave to continue my remarks.

Leave granted; debate adjourned.